DesignRush ranks and reviews consulting firms from around the country and around the world. The winning firms vary by company size, rates, portfolio, review, and location.

According to DesignRush, the best consulting forms “create custom strategies to improve management, better employee satisfaction, and increase business growth.” These firms also strengthen processes through operations and logistics assistance, marketing campaign guidance, accounting advice and more.

VP Legacies’ online courses help thousands of people worldwide build meaningful relationships every day, including at work. When it comes to considering a consulting firm for your projects, you want one that will best help you enhance your business strategy and grow your business.

Top Consulting Firms Enhance Business Strategy

The best consulting services take the time to help clients enhance business strategy, offering specialized expertise that caters exactly to their needs and business growth goals. These tools include:

Information technology to implement certain programs or systems

Marketing to gather competitor analysis, detailed audits, market share information, and business and demographic data to advice on possible ventures

Financial services for revenue-related services to keep your business safe

What to look for in a consulting firm

While there are a number of consulting firms out there, top consulting firms differentiate themselves in how it treats its customers, accessibility, and more. A few factors to consider are:

Are they an effective partner? Top consulting companies promote both the quality and expertise in a true partnership, committed to generating results.

Do they have a global presence? Business success in the modern world means becoming a global brand, able to the necessary insight and unique perspective to expand operations into new territories

Are they digital savvy? Today’s top firms know how to meet the demands of the digital consumer and implement technology to improve business performance.

Do they focus on results? The best consulting firms put their clients first, helping them to achieve specific and measurable goals

Do they serve multiple industries? The consulting firm you choose must have experience in your industry, giving you insight on the challenges companies in that industry face to offer strategies to uncover solutions

Features of top consulting companies

A top consulting company is more than just the services they offer; they are about the characteristics, work ethic, and personality they bring to the table. A few key features of top firms are:

The experience and expertise necessary to take on the job you’ve hired them to do

A proven track record to ensure that your project gets effectively

Creative thinking to come up with innovative ideas to meet the challenges specific to your project

Communication skills to make sure goals are met, challenges are communicated, and issues are resolved

Leadership to take the lead in order to finish the project in a timely and efficient manner

Why VP Legacies?

VP Legacies is a premier personal connection and content creation firm in Denver that helps its clients create a world where people aren’t afraid to personally connect. We want to help not only clients engage externally, but internally to increase employee retention and customer loyalty.

We see storytelling as the key to personal connection, as we are expert storytellers with a process empowering you to truly personally connect with our clients’ audiences. The power in our ability to create personal connection is unending and immeasurable, which has allowed us to grow our business values and processes.

Powered by personal connection

By way building trust, sharing story details, and embracing emotions, we help our clients develop personal connection with their employees and customers. We believe that open communication develops rapport, which in turn, builds trust. This trust empowers you to share your story—and its details—with others. Once a story is told, it produces emotion, which ultimately enables you to personally connect by embracing it.

Additionally, we pride ourselves on delivering the highest quality of service to our clients. This includes transparent communication, timeliness of delivery, a high-quality end product, and a strong client relationship. With these characteristics, we are able to go above and beyond for our clients.

When working with VP Legacies, you are paying for these factors and how they treat your individual project. You get a company that takes the time to really get to know its clients and goes above and beyond to create videos of the highest quality for its clients.

Workplace relationships tend to be a relatively taboo subject that few people openly discuss. But they are definitely a reality, and we all must know the rights and wrongs when it comes to workplace relationships. If you’re considering engaging in a workplace romance, you need to be fully aware of their potential perks and pitfalls. This will allow you to make informed decisions when it comes to engaging or rejecting them.

Our personal connection program is built to help highly driven young professionals navigate and develop their relationship with themselves and others inside and outside of work.

To help you along the way, here’s everything you need to know about handling a personal relationship at work.

Are Workplace Relationships Common?

First, let’s take a look at just how common workplace relationships are. You’re not likely to get a whole lot of honest or accurate information on the topic simply by discussing the concept of workplace relationships with colleagues. After all, the information that spreads around is usually rumors. Sometimes, people will never find out about relationships that are taking place because those involved are discreet. Instead, it’s best to take a look at professional studies that have been conducted in the area. Here are some interesting results that show the status of workplace relationships in the modern-day.

Vault.com found that 58% of employees have engaged in some sort of romantic relationship with a colleague.

Almost half of the employees don’t know their company’s policies regarding workplace romance – this could be because these policies don’t exist in the first place or because they’re not effectively communicated.

Almost one in five employeeshave cheated on their partner with someone from work – 19% of employees admitted to cheating on their partner with a colleague. In contrast, a much larger 44% say they are aware of colleagues who have had affairs at work or during business trips.

Most workplace couples keep their relationship a secret– around 64% of employees who are engaging in a romantic relationship with a colleague will not tell others about this, instead choosing to keep things under the radar.

Three in four people would consider engaging in a workplace romance – 72% of people surveyed would consider participating in a workplace romance should the opportunity arise.

A Note on Workplace Relationships

Before we get any further into our discussion of workplace relationships, it’s essential to note that any workplace relationship has to be consensual between both parties – as with any other relationship. Never assume that you can act romantically with any of your coworkers. This means you should not talk to them in a sexual or intimate tone without given consent. Show respect for others’ personal boundaries and always ask for outright permission to act in any way other than professionally. Remember that people may be polite or lenient to avoid tension in the workplace. You shouldn’t rely on a protest or someone overtly saying “no” to advances. Without clear consent and permission, you may actually be harassing someone.

Be Aware of Potential Legal Repercussions

Legal repercussions can vary depending on where you live. For example, in many countries, personal relationships between any colleagues are deemed completely fine. In others, specific relationships are punishable through fines, imprisonment, or even death. Make sure to be familiar with the regulations in place in the country you’re working in – especially if you’re working overseas where you may be unfamiliar with common law and practice.

Check the Policies of the Company You’re Working For

Many companies have regulations in place when it comes to relationships between colleagues. It’s always worth checking your company’s policies, so you don’t find yourself in breach of them. If there are rules in place that forbid employees from being in relationships, you need to evaluate whether this relationship is worth one of you leaving your role and working somewhere else.

Consider Whether the Relationship is Appropriate

Even if there is consent between both parties, you need to determine whether the relationship is appropriate. For example, a senior figure within a company engaging in a relationship with someone in a junior rank can be deemed problematic due to the inherent power imbalance between the two individuals.

Remain Professional in the Workplace

If everything’s going smoothly and you and your colleague are in a working relationship, it’s essential to remain professional in the workplace. It’s generally best to avoid public displays of affection, and it could be deemed extremely unprofessional to bring personal issues into your professional day – for example, continuing a personal argument within the workplace. It’s also vital that you avoid showing your partner preferential treatment above other colleagues. This can cause issues, as people may begin to feel unfairly treated, and this can result in feelings of resentment which are never productive in a professional environment.

What Can We Say About Personal Relationships at Work?

As you can see, personal relationships in the workplace tend to fall into a relatively grey area. Some would say to avoid them at all costs. Others are in happy marriages with their colleagues and wouldn’t change a thing in the world. Only you can determine what’s best for you. However, to better improve this situation, an online personal connection course can help you maintain a healthy relationship at work.

Hopefully, the above information has helped you make more informed decisions if you do decide to go ahead with a workplace romance!

Have you wanted to learn how to change strangers into friends, friends into best friends and create a personal connection with anyone?

How to Communicate with employees during the coronavirus pandemichttps://vplegacies.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/conference-room.png16001067VP LegaciesVP Legacieshttps://vplegacies.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/conference-room.pngJune 1, 2020June 4, 2020

The Challenge of Communicating Remotely

A recent study from Harvard Business Review showed that 69% of managers are not comfortable communicating with their employees and 57% of employees feel they are not given clear directions at work. This is quite a high number considering the amount of technologies available to us. One would assume that with so many communication tools at our disposal–smartphones, text messaging, e-mail, WiFi, social media–effective communication in the workplace should be a breeze. But it’s apparent that simply having those tools isn’t enough.

Perhaps fostering our work relationships also means learning how to use technology in a way that serves our professional needs. Here at VP Legacies, we recognize the challenges that come with working remotely and are providing you with free, live shows to help foster communication. In today’s post, we’ll share our best practices for maintaining communication with your employees during the current global pandemic.

Why is it important to communicate with employees during a pandemic or other crisis?

Effective communication in the workplace is what makes the whole greater than the sum of its parts. In most workplaces, team members are distinguished by varying levels of skill, experience, and expertise. They are further divided by different responsibilities, duties, and tasks.

Without clear intentions and clarity of expectation from team leaders, even the most devoted and hardworking team members can easily spin off track. Thus, communication can be seen as the glue that keeps a team working together, even as they accomplish their own separate tasks. It’s up to team leaders, department managers, and company executives to establish a culture of transparency and communication so that the company can benefit as a whole.

6 Steps to Effective Communication with Employees During a Pandemic

Technology affords us a multitude of ways to communicate with employees even while working remotely during the pandemic. But as we hinted above, merely downloading the right apps isn’t enough to create a culture of meaningful communication amongst your team. How can we use our tools and resources to increase the quality of communication with our employees?

First, we recommend establishing clear goals for each encounter. This allows you to express to employees or team members why you’re contacting them and what you hope to accomplish. Getting everyone on board from the outset of the conversation will help you focus the direction of the meeting.

Second, share your thoughts on the topic at hand and how discussing this topic is beneficial to a particular project or to the company as a whole.This establishes a level of transparency on your part, thereby encouraging others to be transparent as well. It’s also a way to remind employees that you’re prioritizing the company and starts the conversation off with a positive tone.

Third, open up discussion to receive feedback, suggestions, and observations from your employees. Recognize the value of your employees’ points of view and let them know you’re considering their needs and expectations. Communication is a two-way street so this step is important if you’re serious about connecting with your employees.

Fourth, if necessary, make plans for following up on any ongoing topics or addressing suggestions made by you or others. This shows your employees that you want to continue to communicate with them and also expresses that you care about their feedback.

Fifth, thank your employee or employees for their time. This gesture of respect and gratitude will keep communication lines open and help your employees feel appreciated for their efforts.

Sixth, keep a record of your communication so that you’ll remember what you talked about when you communicate with employees again. The record will also be helpful for keeping minutes of meetings that you’ll share with your employees.

These steps can be used for an entire conversation or you can repeat the first three steps throughout if you’re handling multiple items during a meeting. Let’s take a closer look at how we can apply these steps to remote communication with your employees.

Phone

The phone has been a tool for communication for much longer than any of the other technologies on our list. Even so, it’s easy to become complacent and resort to picking up the phone and rattling off a list of to-dos. In the meantime, all of your best intentions to improve workplace communications are quickly forgotten.

Instead of catching your employees off guard, set up a time to talk on the phone through text message or email (whichever is more appropriate in the context of your workplace). Let them know ahead of time what you want to discuss and your goals for the phone call. This gives them some time to prepare any documentation you’ll be discussing and to consider any suggestions they want to share with you regarding the topic to be discussed.

Once you’re on the call, be sure to share your own thoughts on the topic at hand and why you think this call is necessary. If you’re feeling overwhelmed or are experiencing stress about a certain task, be sure to use your words in a non-threatening manner. Remember, the ultimate goal is figuring out together what is best for your project or company.

Don’t forget to invite suggestions or comments from your employee. Show sincere interest in the employee’s experience of what they’re working on and take note of what they share with you. Finally, ask the employee what they need to complete the task and whether they feel fully equipped to do so.

End your call with an expression of appreciation and be sure to save your notes. You can reference them on future calls with the employee and you’ll be even more prepared the next time around.

Email

Email is a pleasant and professional way of communicating with employees. Be sure to follow email etiquette whenever sending correspondence to your staff. Opening communications with a personable greeting and using the employee’s name is advisable (example: “Hi Tim…”).

Explain why you’re emailing and what you hope to accomplish. Next, share your thoughts on the progress of the task at hand and what you think would benefit the project or company. Then invite the employee to share their suggestions or thoughts on the topic.

Finally, sign off with a gesture of gratitude (example: “Thanks for your help on this project”). Send a follow-up email if you find there are more topics to discuss later on or you want to continue discussing a particular topic. Save your email thread so that you’ll have it as a record of communication.

Video Conference

Video conference applications have become increasingly popular in the past few months as workplaces strive to find ways to stay connected while practicing social distancing. Apps such as Google Hangout, Zoom, and Skype allow businesses to conduct group work meetings even while employees are working from home.

Plan a video conference by scheduling a conference date and time with your employees. You can give them advance notice of what you’ll be discussing through email or any work messaging system you’re currently using. Doing so will allow employees to prepare any documents, presentations, or work product they’d like to discuss on the day of the video conference. If there is anything you’d like employees to see during the online meeting, be sure to email it to the group before the conference starts so they have time to review it.

Start the video meeting off by introducing any new members of the team and expressing what you’d like to accomplish during the meeting. This is a good time to list multiple meeting items so that everyone is up to date. Next, bring up each meeting item, updating your employees on the progress of that task and what you’re hoping to accomplish by the next meeting. Invite the team to share any recommendations or observations for accomplishing that task.

Once each meeting item has been addressed, open up discussion with your employees as to whether they feel the goals of this meeting have been accomplished. Discuss any ongoing topics that you’ll be addressing in future meetings and whether there’s anything you or your team need to follow up on. Thank your employees for their time, energy, and contributions. If you or anyone else at the meeting has taken minutes or recorded the meeting items, email this out later in the day so that everyone has a record of what was discussed.

Clear Communication Will Ensure the Health of your Business

Let’s recap the six steps to clear remote communication:

Establish clear goals and objectives of the conversation or meeting.

Share your thoughts on the meeting item or topic and discuss why addressing this item is beneficial to the company.

Invite employees to share their comments, suggestions, experiences, and observations regarding the topic.

If necessary, plan to follow up on any ongoing items or suggestions/concerns.

Thank your employees for their time.

Keep a record of the encounter and send out meeting minutes, if any.

Creating an environment of clear and open communication in the workplace is important to the health of your business. Even while working remotely, strong team leaders can take this opportunity to boost morale and foster growth by prioritizing meaningful connections with employees. With the help of modern technology and our six steps to effective remote communication, you can continue to accomplish important tasks and build team culture through the pandemic.

Take this time to advance your communication skills to the next level. VP Legacies is currently offering a free course to help others like you improve their soft skills and maintain important connections during this time of isolation. Check out How To Personally Connect in the Midst a Global Pandemic, live daily on Instagram and Facebook.

Have you wanted to learn how to change strangers into friends, friends into best friends and create a personal connection with anyone?

Coping with Working from Home During the COVID-19 Pandemichttps://vplegacies.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/woman-looking-at-computer.png16001312VP LegaciesVP Legacieshttps://vplegacies.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/woman-looking-at-computer.pngMay 24, 2020June 4, 2020

Sometimes working from home can be a lonely task, especially now when the world is experiencing the height of a pandemic. It is not always easy to cope with, and sometimes dealing with loneliness can be the worst thing in the world, but there are things that you can do to try and combat this feeling. You might not see it now, but by the time you have finished reading this article, you are going to have a couple of ideas on what you should do if you are feeling lonely when working from home.

Move During Your Break

One of the things that are very beneficial to your health and mental space is making sure that you are moving during your breaks throughout the day. Just because you are working from home does not mean that you should stop being active.

Taking breaks is important, so if you haven’t been moving regularly, then you should get into the habit of it. Going for a walk is one of the best things you can do in a short period of time. Head to the closest park and go for a walk around in nature for a little while before getting back to work. You will feel much better for having gone outside for a little while.

Or, if you don’t want to go outside because you think it will interrupt your workflow, stay at home and do some simple exercises. As long as it gets your body moving, it doesn’t matter what you choose to do. You definitely don’t want to become a couch potato, and regular movement is the best way to avoid this.

Set Up Virtual Meetings

If you are feeling lonely during Social Distancing, something you could consider is setting up virtual meetings. It’s always nice to talk to other people, and even if they are not physically with you, that shouldn’t stop you from having meetings to discuss projects or work. Talk to your clients or others that you work with, and arrange something through a platform such as Skype or one of the many other platforms. This will help you to feel less alone as it will give you the chance to interact with other people who are working on the same things that you are.

You can even set these up so that they are a weekly occurrence, and you can set them up with a range of different people. Organize times to talk to your clients, and time to talk to the people that you work with so that you have everything you need for these meetings. Just don’t forget that they are actually meetings, and you need to look professional!

Look For Help Coping

There are plenty of sites out there, such as VP Legacies that are there to help you cope with feelings such as loneliness. It’s common, so you shouldn’t feel bad or ashamed for feeling the way you do. It’s hard to be on your own a lot, and when you work from home, this can sometimes be the case.

VP Legacies offer a number of different courses that you can take to help you find happiness. These include Personal Connection 101, How To Build A Relationship With Yourself, and How To Personally Connect – Pandemic.

The last course that we mentioned is currently free for people to take, which is an added benefit. Companies like this also have a daily life on Facebook and Instagram to talk to their followers and help in any way that they can.

It’s okay to admit that you need help coping, and that is exactly what sites like this are for. It’s okay not to be okay with feeling lonely, you just need help figuring out what to do about it.

You’re Not Actually Alone

Something that is important to remember is that you are not actually alone. Just because someone might not physically be there with you, there are likely still people around to help you. While it is true that being lonely has been connected with higher productivity levels because it pushes you to do more work, you can’t do it alone. You need to actively create a personal community around you that is going to be there to help you. If you don’t do this, then you might end up not being able to get out of your pit of loneliness in the future.

As well as this, there are going to be others around like your friends and family. Make sure to call and check in with them so that they can remind you that you aren’t on your own. Sometimes this is all you need to make you feel better because, unfortunately, sometimes being an entrepreneur and working from home is difficult and isolating.

Find Others Like You

We just talked a little about building up a community, and finding others like you is a great way to start. There are plenty of forums online that you can use to help you find other people who are in the same boat as you. It might take a little while for you to feel this sense of community, but it is definitely going to be worth it when you get there.

Trust us when we say that there are plenty of people who feel the way you do and are looking for a community in the same way, it’s just a matter of finding them. You can make posts on social media boards and find some sites that are set up with the specific intention of helping people find each other. It’s a fantastic way of building up those around you and coming to realize that you don’t have to feel lonely working from home.

We hope that you have found this article helpful, and now have some ideas about what you can do if you are feeling lonely working from home, especially right now when the pandemic is in full swing. Good luck, and we hope you start to feel better soon!

Have you wanted to learn how to change strangers into friends, friends into best friends and create a personal connection with anyone?

5 Ways to Build Personal Connections in the Workplace as a New Hirehttps://vplegacies.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/cloud-and-sky.png1280720VP LegaciesVP Legacieshttps://vplegacies.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/cloud-and-sky.pngMay 23, 2020June 4, 2020

Everyone knows that awkward feeling of being the new hire at a workplace and not having anyone to spend the lunch-break with. Building a social network fast at work will help you in many different ways: it will make it easier for you to seek help, it will open more career opportunities, it will help you to stay motivated, and keep track of the emotional atmosphere at work.

In short, it will simply make communication easier. Therefore helping you to connect with your peers and to enjoy your time at the office.

Introverts vs. Extroverts: Can Both Make Personal Connections?

We are usually taught that there are two types of people, extroverts and introverts. And that extroverts have a much easier time relating to others and building social networks. While this is true, being social is not a gift. It is a trainable skill, and with practice anyone can become better at making interpersonal connections.

Let’s have a look at 5 ways that can help you build your social network at work more efficiently and effectively.

1 Be present in your space to personally connect

Don’t be the person who shows up at work every morning, works at the desk, and then leaves without anyone noticing. Start presenting yourself to everyone you meet at the office the first day, and tell them why you are there. From there on, greet everyone in the morning and say goodbye to them in the evening, even (and especially) if they are not in your way.

This will show them that you are open to communication and that you are aware of them, stimulating your peers to do the same. You will more likely not be able to greet everyone, but that is not the point. Building personal networks is all about going out of your usual social environment and trying to develop communication channels with people you would not connect with otherwise.

2 Divide social time from work time

We easily lose the balance between social interactions and productivity. We either neglect work to build relationships or we focus too much on our tasks and forget everyone around us.

Work hard during your working hours, and enjoy a good cup of coffee with your coworkers during the breaks. In this way, you will make your boss happy without risking to overwork or being the “antisocial” one on the team.

3 Embrace emotions to personally connect

This is something we all struggle with: in an attempt to please everyone, some people fall into a state of “emotional neutrality,” suppressing every strong emotion they feel.

Why show your personal feelings?

If you do this, you will either be seen as someone emotionless or someone who hides their own true feelings, therefore who is better not to trust.

What you want to do is embrace your emotions and show your personality to your peers, it will tell them that you are genuine and show them your taste. They will either sympathize with you or at least respect you for being honest.

Develop emotional awareness

Try to talk to many different people and get a feeling of what the common feelings at the workplace are. Discovering the “emotional atmosphere” will help you to move better in the social environment and ease your communications.

Lastly, ask questions if you feel like your peers are not doing well and offer your help or support. Remember that people connect through joy or pain, and emotions are the best gateway for long term relationships.

4 Promote professional and personal social events to create a personal connection

The best environments to create new connections are in person at social events, therefore, you should do your part to encourage them. Participate in the ones you like and most importantly explain why you don’t go when you don’t.

The last thing you want is people to think that you didn’t go because you don’t like them or because you have better things to do with your time. Don’t get us wrong, it is ok to dislike someone, but try to always be fair and don’t let your bias influence you. Give everyone a chance, you might be surprised how they behave in different situations.

How to connect if you don’t enjoy standard social events?

Furthermore, if you find yourself skipping all the social events because you just don’t like them, then start proposing different ones yourself. Try to bring your peers in an environment in which you feel comfortable and in activities that you enjoy.

5 Be aware of other’s importance to win more connections

Lastly, let’s focus on the most crucial concept to build more social connections. This last section is about being true to yourself and practicing what you preach.

A team that works well together is a team that brings results. Therefore, promoting sporting events as a team-building and personal connection tool will help produce the results every company is after.

Often times, especially when businesses become larger and the number of employees increases, the effectiveness of teamwork tends to decrease. This happens because the connections with new coworkers are not as strong.

Additionally, the time to dedicate to each person becomes progressively less and less. Eventually, you end up with a weaker network between team members and a low performing division.

At this point, most of us think that this is just how things go, but what is often overlooked is that problem solving and group work are like muscles. They can, and should, be trained and used to create personal connections.

We have a lot of personal connections in our lives. There’s our family. Then there’s our friends. But one important relationship out there that we often overlook is the bond we have with our coworkers and employees. These relationships often take a different approach, which VP Legacies discuss in our Personal Connection 101 course.

But for now, let’s look at how sporting events can help you with team-building, personal connection, and increase the overall performance of your team. This is especially important during the coronavirus pandemic, since many offices have become remote. It may seem impossible to have the same connections with your coworkers when you can’t chat with them face-to-face or work together on a project, but with the right mindset and bonding experiences, you’ll find that your connections can be stronger than ever. Even from home.

Use Sports as a Safe Training Environment for Your Employees

If teamwork can be trained, then we need a way to practice without hurting the company. Here friendly competitions come into play. Creating a safe environment where your employees can experiment is crucial to improve their performance. You will never have a better team if you don’t give them the opportunity to train.

By utilizing sports to practice teamwork, you allow your employees to train these skills in a new environment. This removes the frustration they might be feeling at the office for not performing well as a team. While playing sports, they will start to practice without fear of failure. This allows them to focus on a fun and social task at hand for experimentation. In the end, this helps build personal connection, communication skills and a better understanding of their capabilities.

Strengthen Team Cohesion Through Matches

Divide the different sections of your company into teams and organize tournaments of team sports (soccer, basketball, etc.). Each division will have to communicate, practice problem solving, and read the opponent to bring home the victory.

This “group effort” will encourage everyone to work toward common goals and will build a sense of community. All aspects will be then transferred to their everyday life in the office. If you’re doing this from home, create a Slack channel for each “team” so they can strategize and bond together over the challenge and the tasks at hand.

Build Healthy Competition to Improve Results

In addition, to enhance the performance of single teams, tournaments build a healthy competition that drive everyone to do better. After the event, a slight “game” atmosphere will remain, and the general quality of the work produced by the divisions will improve.

And don’t be afraid to offer rewards, whether it’s a fun activity or cash money. Nobody will ever complain about receiving a gift card. But to further build on these relationships, maybe offer a fun game night over Zoom for the winners (where winners of those games will get some type of prize). This creates an opportunity for coworkers to hang out together even when projects and deadlines are not involved, carrying over that sense of comradery into every-day work life.

Using Soccer as an Example

Imagine that we have 30 employees: we can divide them into 6 teams of 5 people. At this point, we can start planning the tournament. Set up symbolic prizes for the first team and for the 3 best players (free lunch at the office or something similar). Randomize the order of the matches and that’s it.

You just set up a perfect environment for the creation of personal connection. Your employees will be forced to work as a team toward a common result and bond with each other= to win the prizes. Even if in a playful way, you are training their ability to perform better as a team.

Create a “safety net” for More Sustainability in the Long Run

Sporting activities, especially group ones, are perfect for connecting and creating relationships. Building connections in a slightly competitive environment will form deeper bonds faster, which will, realistically, perform better under pressure.

Multiply this mechanism for all of your employees and you will end up with a network of strong and reliable personal connections.

This “safety network” is really the key to success when things get complicated in the office. Supporting each other during tough times helps everyone with their tasks and put effort into each project.

If you are aiming for long-term success, the sustainability of your team =makes a difference. A supportive system gives flexibility to the team and will allow it to maintain the same level of performance even if some members are going through difficult situations.

Sports, Team-building and Creating Personal Connection are Fun and Will Improve Office Culture

Physical activity is ultimately just fun, and it will help you to spread joy among your employees and colleagues. Group activities that involve team play and physical exercise have been shown to lower stress levels and ease the tensions in the workplace. They promote a more relaxed and proactive attitude, which is the approach you are looking for in a team member.

For this reason, it is best practice to schedule different activities during the year. In this way, you will make sure to relieve stress levels and office tensions.=. In addition to this, you will encourage new entries to connect with their peers and become part of the community.

The benefits of using sporting events as a team-building tool are summarized below:

Create a safe environment for your employees to experiment and become better team members.

Remove any frustration or fear of failure, allowing them to concentrate only on working as well as possible together.

Promote a team-oriented mindset and encourage everyone to work toward a common goal as part of a community.

Encourage healthy competition in your own company, which will push every division to perform better.

Allow the formation of deep networks between your employees, that will support them during hard times and grant you a more stable performance over time.

Just give your workers a good time and help them to ease tensions in the workplace. A crucial part of long term success.

These kinds of bonding activities are especially important in the coming months, now that employees are remote. A chance to work together as a team, feel accomplished and rewarded, and even find ways to bond outside of projects, will keep your coworkers feeling connected even when they’re physically apart.

A lot of people aren’t used to working remotely and could feel disconnected now that there’s nobody to say “hi” to in the office or no brainstorming sessions in the meeting room. But creating a vibe of teamwork and motivation will give everyone a new reason to bond with each other, even if it’s over Zoom calls instead.

The Top 7 Tips on How to Deal With Anxiety at Workhttps://vplegacies.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/anxious-man.png940627VP LegaciesVP Legacieshttps://vplegacies.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/anxious-man.pngMarch 27, 2020April 12, 2020

The Top Tips on How to Deal With Anxiety at Work

Most of our lives are centered around our careers. Our jobs provide money for the things we need. As a result, we often feel the pressure to outperform ourselves and succeed to the highest degree.

Naturally, this can lead to anxiety. Anxiety to perform well, get along with our co-workers, and stay in our boss’s good graces. However, while some of these stressors help drive us to become the best versions of ourselves, they can also lead to crippling anxiety.

At VP Legacies, we strive to make your workplace environment healthy by creating channels for positive Personal Connection®. Follow along as we dive into our top seven tips on how to deal with anxiety at work, where it comes from, and how it can affect you.

Why Do You Get Anxious?

First, let’s talk about why you get anxiety.

For many people who suffer from social anxiety, there’s a level of nervousness that presents itself simply from being around others. However, there are a wide variety of jobs, work environments, and causes behind work-related social anxiety.

To learn how to deal with anxiety at work, you must first establish where the anxiety comes from. Here are the two most common sources.

High Expectations

The business arena is a dog-eat-dog world. More than50 percent of small businesses fail within the first five years. If the company you work for isn’t better than it’s competitors, it will soon go under and you would be out of a job.

There’s a reason your boss pushes for efficient work environments and ever-improving productivity. Unfortunately, these high expectations from above can lead to overwhelming anxiety, which can have several negative side effects.

Tip #1 – Learning how to deal with anxiety at work means learning how to communicate openly with your boss. Don’t agree to improbable deadlines or take on more than you can handle. Ask for clarification if you’re confused or need more guidance.

Facing New Scenarios

Another common source of anxiety in the workplace comes from facing new and potentially “scary” scenarios at work. What if you can’t handle it? What if you somehow embarrass yourself?

In a growing and thriving business, new scenarios are inevitable. They’re also desirable. By embracing new scenarios and responsibilities, you can grow with the company, improve your skillset, and learn new things, making yourself increasingly valuable to your employers.

Tip #2 – Accept that anxiety isn’t reality; it is a limiting fear of a possible event that may never happen. The more you indulge those negative thoughts and feelings, the more you will be crippled by them and lose opportunities to build Personal Connection® with those around you. Stay conscious about the things you’re telling yourself and shape them into positive thoughts.

How Anxiety Can Affect You

As we have already suggested, anxiety can be a debilitating mental disorder. Learning how to deal with anxiety at work is vital for your performance but also your sense of well-being. Failing to address your anxiety can lead to several negative outcomes, such as:

Tip #3 – Some anxiety at work is unavoidable. Learn to embrace the natural feeling of discomfort and work through it by turning your thoughts outward toward the task, rather than focusing on your anxiety.

Facing Anxiety in Different Scenarios

Let’s take a closer look at different scenarios in the workplace that may cause you anxiety. Keep in mind, once again, that some of these scenarios do entail a certain level of expected anxiety. The key is learning how to overcome debilitating or detrimental anxiety.

Daily Interactions

Daily interactions is an especially important area to focus on how to deal with anxiety at work. Soft skills are an important part of everyday life at work.

Soft skills refer to your ability to communicate and get along with others. While it may be your anxiety keeping you from speaking with others, it may be misinterpreted. Your co-workers may find you unfriendly or your boss may see you as uninvested.

Tip #4 – Educate yourself on and practice soft skills. For example, learn everyone’s name and something important about them. Say “hi” or acknowledge people in passing and avoid gossiping. You can educate yourself on soft skills by taking a look at our Personal Connection® 101 course. If you’re a manager, you can implement it as part of ongoing training.

Small Meetings

For some people, a small meeting may pose a bigger opportunity for anxiety than larger meetings. They’re more intimate and it’s probably inevitable that the attention will fall on you at some point.

However, small meetings are vital for increasing productivity and critical thinking. It’s important that you’re fully present and involved. This is not a good time to retreat into yourself and shy away from the conversation.

Large Meetings

If larger groups of people intimidate you, learning how to deal with anxiety at work may be vital for functioning in bigger meetings. Fortunately, in bigger meetings, you’re less likely to be in the spotlight. However, should the spotlight fall on you, you need to be able to speak and perform.

Tip #5 – Avoid obsessing over the room’s attention falling on you. Instead, focus on what the speaker is saying. This will help you stay in the moment and soften the internal monologue of negative thoughts in your head.

One-On-Ones

One-on-one scenarios, especially with executives or people with management positions, can be exceedingly difficult for people who suffer from social anxiety. In these scenarios, you have the undivided attention of the person across from you. This can be made worse if the one-on-one is with your boss.

Once again, we encourage you to direct your attention outward. Don’t get sucked into worrying about how nervous you are, how you look, what they’re thinking about you, and so on. Remember that it doesn’t have to be scary, and this is one of the best chances to really get to know someone and build Personal Connection®.

Giving a Speech

In America, people’s biggest fear is public speaking. It’s normal for you to have anxiety before speaking in front of a group of people. However, if it’s part of your job, it’s something you’ll have to learn to overcome.

Tip #6 – Focus on the facts and the issue at hand. While it may feel overwhelming to have all eyes on you, remember your purpose for being there. Focus on using neutral language (“I think, I feel”) and ask for input to keep everyone involved.

Realizing Discomfort is Normal

Finally, we spoke earlier about how certain levels of anxiety are normal, and can even be good. If there was nothing new, nothing challenging, and nothing uncertain in life, we would be a truly boring existence.

Not only is it normal for you to feel anxiety, but everyone around you feels it too. While some may be able to handle it better or in different ways, understand that you’re not alone.

Tip #7 – Practice radical acceptance that certain moments in life and at work are going to be uncomfortable. Embrace these moments for what they are – the ultimate teachers. Most of our significant growth happens through pain and discomfort.

Do You Need Help Learning How to Deal With Anxiety at Work?

If you want to advance in your career and thrive in life, learning how to deal with anxiety at work is paramount. However, depending on the severity of your anxiety, you may not be able to do it on your own, and that’s okay. We can help.

Take a look at some of our courses, like Personal Connection® 101, designed to immediately create positive changes in your life.

How to Retain Top Level Employees (The Right Way!)https://vplegacies.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/Screen-Shot-2020-02-20-at-1.16.09-PM.png1138642VP LegaciesVP Legacieshttps://vplegacies.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/Screen-Shot-2020-02-20-at-1.16.09-PM.pngMarch 19, 2020April 6, 2020

The tech industry has the highest turnover rate out of all other business sectors at 13.2%. If you work in tech, this might not surprise you at all. Still, it’s getting more and more difficult to retain top level employees at any business and within any industry. On average, employees switch jobs every 4 ½ years.

But creating a strategy to keep top talent is a must if you hope to maximize your company’s success. Employees are your company’s best asset. Building genuine personal connections with your employees can help them envision a long-term career path at your business.

Empty promises and meaningless employee resources aren’t enough for your most talented employees. By focusing on communication and Personal Connection®, you can create an authentic retention strategy that truly works. VP Legacies creates courses around the value of Personal Connection® in the workplace. With this ideal in mind, here’s our guide to retaining top level employees.

Interviewing and On-boarding to Retain Top Level Employees

Applying and interviewing can be an employee’s first impression of a company, so it’s important to get this stage right. The recruiting and application process allows you to show off your company culture. You can then find attributes in your candidates that are well-aligned with those of your company, making both the hiring and retention process easier.

A person’s resume is also a good opportunity to see if they often switch jobs and to ask them why. Maybe they’re looking for the perfect role and your company has that to offer them. But if they seem to be bouncing from one place to another, this may indicate that they don’t have a strong sense of loyalty or follow-through.

Another one of the first impressions of a company is its onboarding program. A positive onboarding experience will stick with an employee and give them a clue in to the kinds of professional development you have to offer.

Increasing Engagement Opportunities

Retaining these employees also means increasing engagement. When employees feel disengaged, the company may start to see them leaving in large numbers.

Employee engagement goes beyond the initial weeks of on-boarding. If you’re first starting with creating an engagement strategy, you can rely on the opinions of employees.

Gather information from your employees with a survey of intelligent questions. This will give you a pulse-check on their feelings and help you think about ways to improve workplace culture.

Anonymous surveys can be a great way to allow employees to be open and honest without fear of repercussions. Use the information in these surveys to create an engagement strategy that will work for both the company and employees.

Only 33 percent of new employees feel engaged. To beat this statistic, companies will need to have a strategic approach to engagement. This is an important stage in retaining top-level employees within their first year.

To keep up with engagement, it’s essential to check-in with employees beyond their initial onboarding. Pair your engagement plan with an internal communication strategy to guarantee success.

Once you’ve gained an employee’s loyalty and engagement, they will expect to be paid based on industry standards.

Fair and Competitive Compensation

With sites like Glassdoor, employees are more informed than ever about industry standards for pay. If you’re not meeting these and making competitive offers, employees will know.

Revenue-sharing can be key here, as you’re tying a part of the employee’s wages to the company’s performance. This can help align their productivity with the company’s revenue and profit. So the incentive to stay with the company as it grows is tied to their compensation.

Another important aspect of compensation is an employee’s benefits package. This also helps to entice top talent during the hiring stage. A competitive benefits package is second to salary but can help to make an employee feel valued.

But an important aspect to keep top of mind is that the benefits program should not be so general that it could be applied to any employee. Targeted benefits packages create a more effective strategy for improving engagement and retention because they show that upper-level management has taken the time to connect with employees as individuals.

The rewards you give to employees should also stretch beyond financial compensation. All employees want to feel valued in ways that are not just monetary.

Genuine Employee Recognition

Employees appreciate the recognition that feels genuine and tied to their hard work. Giving awards in front of a large company audience can go a long way by making a top-level employee feel appreciated.

You can increase engagement by having department or company parties, along with other special events. Lunches with executives, free clothing with the company logo, and volunteer outings are all great options. All these efforts build good employee morale and provide a chance for them to connect with other top employees.

To remain competitive with hiring and retention, flexible schedules and paid time off will be considered.

Flexible Schedules and Generous Time Off

Today’s workforce wants flexibility in their schedules that allow them to be remote. When employees can work from home, you’re showing them that you’re willing to adapt to their home life and help them maintain a healthy work-life balance. Flexible hours and having the option to work from home (at least occasionally) keep employees happier and more productive. That’s because employees tend to be highly productive for 3 hours in an 8 hour day. Flexible schedules can allow them to take breaks when they need to, creating efficiency when they’re actually working.

It’s also important to set work from home expectations and a clear policy ahead of time so that there’s no ambiguity. An employee will want to be set up for success while having a flexible schedule so that they can continue to enjoy this perk.

Employees also want generous time off for both vacation and sick days. Having breaks from work can be beneficial to an employee’s productivity and the relationship with their company.

It’s unreasonable to expect employees to keep operating at 100 percent efficiency without having time off to relax. Having breaks and relaxation time is important even on a day-to-day basis. Pacing work can be key to keeping employees efficient so they don’t easily burn out and become resentful.

No matter your work-from-home and vacation policy, it’s important to communicate clearly. You’ll run into fewer issues with your top level employees if you set guidelines in a way that’s easy to understand.

Invest in a Professional Development Program

After you’ve hired top talent, you know they’ll be great at what they do. But it’s important to allow them to keep growing and enhancing their skills.

You can devote some of your resources to providing ongoing training, whether they are short eLearning modules, longer lectures and media courses, or a combination of all of the above. Companies have a great opportunity to provide online courses to their employees. This can help them improve their skills.

A mentorship program also helps employees grow. This can create a new pool of potential leaders by pairing more senior employees with newer ones. This type of training program can be a cost-effective strategy for building a positive company culture.

Once employees have loyalty for their company and a desire to build on their skills, they should also be allowed to grow from within.

If you continue to hire outside talent, the best employees will receive the message that their career path will be short-lived. Create paths to promotion and employees will want to stay put.

Employees Remember How You Make Them Feel

Beyond having opportunities to advance, employees want to feel seen and respected. Indeed, people will always remember how you made them feel. Focusing on employee happiness creates an intangible sense of company loyalty within employees.

Having solid support systems from the highest level will allow managers to be respectful and help to grow a positive workspace. The managers will then take the support they’re given and help to support their contributors. Remember that an overworked and stressed employee will likely feel demoralized and disconnected from your team.

Also, if you want employees to be self-sufficient and productive, even while working from home, you want to show that you trust them to do so.

Giving employees new responsibilities shows that you value their abilities and know they are hard workers. It will also encourage them to continue to grow.

Retaining Top Level Employees Will Help Your Company Succeed

It’s important to keep in mind that all this effort will go both ways. When you show employees respect, they will feel more enthusiastic about staying at your company. If you continue to create opportunities for advancement and give employees fair pay, they’ll remain engaged.

About 1200 CEOs left their jobs in 2019. To avoid your top talent leaving, it’s important to take the time to invest in the right strategies that will keep employees engaged and invested in your company. That means creating a strong recruitment plan that clearly shows your company’s identity and providing plenty of opportunities for employee feedback, recognition, and learning every year. Get started with VP Legacies to build an effective employee branding strategy. We’ll help you develop an actionable plan that reaches current and prospective employees on an emotional level.Connect with us to find ways to improve relationships at your company and retain top level employees.

Properly developing and scaling an organization requires constant (and real-time) attention to both external and internal stakeholders. Employees form the majority of internal stakeholders and are a vital part of the development and progress of any company.

Employers benefit from the development of their employees, which is why good internal communication is crucial for the successful operation of any business. Each side relies on the other one, and together they help with the growth and progress of your organization. At VP Legacies, we’re dedicated to helping you streamline internal communication. Here are the top 12 challenges of which you should be aware.

Why Does Internal Communication Matter?

While we lack the skill to read each other’s minds, there’s a lot we can find out just by paying a little bit more attention. Communication isn’t just important in family relationships, romantic relationships, and friendships, but it is applicable for corporations as well. Without communication, a workplace is not a connective environment for employees.

Each and every company, regardless of how big or small it is, relies on communication for a smooth organizational flow. This helps eliminate countless challenges that an organization has to face when it comes to their internal communication strategy and planning. Just like humans, communication is a multi-dimensional concept that needs to be approached with nuance.

Understanding the challenges helps one gain an understanding of how to identify and overcome them in their own organization.

12 Corporate Communication Challenges

Here are twelve common corporate communication challenges that employers and employees face. Understanding them is the first step to building a solid corporate communication foundation to solidify strong personal connections throughout the workplace.

1. Lack Of Feedback

For an employee, it’s always a big cause of concern if they are kept in the dark about their own growth in the company. An employee spends upwards of 8 hours every day in any given organization, and they want to know they have opportunities for growth and professional development.

Growth, without any feedback, is impossible to achieve. Providing timely feedback, whether negative or positive, is a must for effective internal communication. It’s important to connect with employees on a one-on-one basis so they know you care about their growth and they can further hone in their valuable skills.

Lack of growth is one of the major reasons for employee turnover, putting a major dent in talent retention costs and affects the morale of the entire organization. With proper feedback, an employee feels valued and believes that their company is providing them with room for ample growth.

2. Absence Of Strategy

As important as corporate communication is, it often takes a backseat. Many organizations tend to neglect the importance of having a strong internal communication strategy as they feel like it lacks any tangible benefits.

So, they often just go with the flow and cross the metaphorical communication bridge after there’s a gap. This lack of strategy makes Personal Connection® difficult, since employees won’t know how to communicate information.

With a solid strategy in place, companies are ready for any situation, foreseen or unforeseen. Developing a strategy is not an easy task. Quite the contrary, it requires a thorough understanding of communication gaps, employee needs, and the effect of existing strategies.

With the help of a proper strategy, one can realize common pitfalls, the urgency of implementation, degree of intervention and more important factors that determine the plan of action for the particular organization.

3. Constant Communication Overload

One might think the best way to improve communication inside an organization is to bombard employees with loads of emails and messages. Who has ever benefited from a seemingly never ending chain of emails?

Employees often feel overwhelmed with constant back and forth, replying, or reading messages that they have nothing to do with. This wastes a lot of time and energy, not to forget reduces overall productivity. Many organizations fail to notice or address information overload. Frequent but inefficient internal communication can often feel impersonal, creating a disconnect within your organization.

Not every piece of information is relevant to all employees and even if it is, it is often not conveyed to them in the right manner or it is often presented without ample information.

4. Communication Without Context

Alongside information overload, a lack of informational context can also negatively impact internal communication. Many managers or even teammates pass along information assuming that the other person is well aware of the context of the conversation. This puts the receiver at a disadvantage. Many people don’t take the initiative to inquire about the context to avoid seeming ignorant or not knowledgeable.

They handle the task at hand without thinking about the history of communication, in turn leading to serious missteps. Hence, all communication should have concise, but relevant information attached. Alternatively, employees should be given a small brief to counter the contextual hurdle.

5. Internal Transparency

The employer-employee relationship is based on trust. For an employee, the company that they’re working in is often their only source of income. Here, any decision made by the company has a huge effect on the employees.

The challenge that many organizations face is to inform their employees about any events that have taken place or are about to be put into action. It is always better than an employee finds out about company news from internal communication rather than external sources, such as the press or social media.

Big news like layoffs, bankruptcy or even small updates are necessary to provide through expedient internal communication methods.

6. Using The Right Tools

Any communication strategy is incomplete without the right tools. There are many applications and software that help with executing communication strategies, including VP Legacies eLearning courses.

These online tools have the right bandwidth to help small to large companies and are often more efficient than regular tools and applications. Having the right tools at one’s disposal makes the difference of day and night in terms of implementation any internal communication strategy.

Even if the strategy has some shortcomings, the right tools can overcome them while also making way for the development of real Personal Connection®.

7. Lack Of Balance

Just like every other aspect of one’s life, communication requires a balanced approach. This, however, is more often than not how it works. In most organizations, the common challenge everyone faces is either there is too much or too little internal communication happening.

Corporations can’t seem to find the point where the scales balance themselves. Not everything needs to be shared with teams in an organization and similarly, they shouldn’t be left out of important announcements.

To strike the right balance, a combination of the right timing, medium and message have to be crafted. Use appropriate channels for relevant announcements at the right time and there will be a balanced internal communication plan.

With this combination, not only will there be clarity in the message but the resources will be used in an optimum manner. Your employees will get all the information they need without anything that’s irrelevant, helping them feel more connected to your company’s goals.

8. Budget Restrictions

Just like any other strategy, an internal communication strategy requires dedicated resource allocation, which many companies or HR departments don’t have the liberty to do.

In such scenarios, it becomes difficult to have a strong corporate communication strategy. Money is always a point of contention in an organization, regardless of its size.

In such cases, communication tends to take a backseat. To counter this, one need not look too far. There are many options to outsource communication strategy implementation with the help of third-party providers and software.

Not only does this take the burden off of the internal departments but it also ends up being cheaper and easier to execute.

9. Onboarding New Employees

When a company onboards a new employee, they aren’t just adding an additional person. They’re bringing in a whole new perception, ideology, communication medium, and personality into the fold.

Companies are constantly hiring, and this means having to familiarize new employees with the company culture time and again. This also means that the new employees have to understand and learn the communication strategy of their new company, which is often different from their old company’s strategy.

This challenge can only be solved by having a clear set of guidelines and manuals in place that can help new hires navigate the do’s and don’ts’ of an organization. Great training programs like microlearning can be helpful. This will help streamline the process and make it easier for all the parties involved in the process. It’s also important to make new employees feel welcome to increase the likelihood of employee retention. When you make it known that new hires are valuable assets to your team, you save resources and create a positive workplace culture.

10. Use Of Jargon

In a professional environment, there are plenty of opportunities for a person to sound smart in the disguise of being professional. The use of jargon is a common pain-point in many organizations.

Whether it’s emails, manuals, presentations or any other form of communication, it is relatively easy for jargon to slip into sentences. Jargon has no real use in today’s corporate scenario – not only is it highly inefficient, but it can detract meaning from content.

If the reader spends half of their time trying to figure out what certain words mean instead of understanding the core meaning of the entire text, then that piece has not served its intended purpose.

To avoid this, an organization must keep things simple. The key here is to actively avoid and discourage jargon throughout the organization. A little bit can be useful as shorthand, but too much can come off as pretentious. By setting this culture, there is an open and collaborative path that leads to efficient communication.

11. The Device Dilemma

Gone are the days when work was limited to the office desktop. Technology is evolving by the minute and access to information is getting handy. From desktops, laptops, tablets, mobiles and even smartwatches, there is simply too much to keep up with from a communication standpoint.

Most companies have developed their communication strategy keeping just the workplace in mind. This limits the outreach of the message and also fails to tap into the potential that is mobility.

On average, people have around five email addresses and two to three devices. This says a lot about how people are consuming information on a daily basis. Optimizing one’s communication strategy to include the preferred devices, aka mobile phones and tablets will have a huge impact on the increased efficiency of the communication strategy.

This also helps develop a stronger Personal Connection® with the employees as it gives them the freedom to access information as and when they please and even while on the move.

12. Cross-Department Communication

An organization is made of several small departments that co-exist and function together to uplift the company as a whole. While many departments don’t overlap, there are instances wherein they might need to work together or communicate with each other.

This tends to be a pitfall for many organizations. In providing a distinction between departments, they often fail to establish a connection that is needed for seamless communication.

This gives way to misunderstandings, lack of clarity, finger-pointing, etc. All these hinder productivity and company morale.

By establishing clear communication guidelines and by introducing different teams to each other and inculcating a sense of togetherness, there is a reduced change of any misstep.

Successful implementation of an internal communication strategy depends on the strength of the connection that gets formed between the employees. With this, there is peaceful co-existence and a collaborative environment within the organization

Communication with Real Connections

Corporate communication is not the easiest of hurdles to overcome, which is precisely why there needs to be institutional proactiveness in doing so. Organizations need to realize the importance of internal communication and the role that it plays in the success of the company and its bottom line growth.

Whether it is developing a strong Personal Connection® or tweaking the existing communication strategy, no step is too small. Corporate communication is an ongoing affair, and one that needs constant monitoring and upgrades.

Times change, people evolve and an organization’s approach to ensuring proper communication within their ranks too has to evolve overtime.

How to Prepare Employees for a Recessionhttps://vplegacies.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/Screen-Shot-2020-01-19-at-3.40.35-PM.png1232766VP LegaciesVP Legacieshttps://vplegacies.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/Screen-Shot-2020-01-19-at-3.40.35-PM.pngFebruary 19, 2020April 6, 2020

A smart business prepares itself for anything, especially for a recession. A recession forces human resource personnel to make strategic decisions about spending that might affect employees in a negative way. In times like these, effective internal communication is more important than ever.

Luckily, there are signs companies can look for that might indicate a recession so they have ample amount of time to prepare their employees. For example, the rising rate of unemployment and declining quit rate are signs pointing towards a recession. When a recruiter tells the company that the number of job postings is going down, then that means a recession is approaching within six months.

Luckily, if the employer knows that a recession is about to happen, there are strategies that they can take to prepare their employees. At VP Legacies, we help you retain your valuable employees with strategies for personal connection and effective internal communication. Here’s our guide to preparing them for a recession.

Track Metrics

The first step in planning for a recession is to have a metric in place. Companies without a tracking metric lack preparation and might end up having to make more spending cuts than necessary. This system should review information about compensation, training, productivity, and other items related to the business goals and the financial aspect. These data will help organizations know what to expect if they were to downsize and might even help them minimize layoffs.

Performance Issues

No one wants to layoff their employees, but sometimes, this is inevitable. Before the recession begins, human resources need to evaluate and document the employee’s work. The common mistake that businesses make is laying off employees that underperform without ample documentation. However, if there is no proof that the employee is underperforming, then that is a lawsuit waiting to happen.

Another aspect is to be cautious of the reason for laying off an employee. For example, an older and less productive worker can file a lawsuit claiming that he can’t work in the company anymore because of his age. The last thing you want is a company to be struck with months of litigation that can compromise your team.

Documenting employee performance encourages employees to perform well, exceeding expectations during a recession and helping to minimize the number of cuts your company needs to make.

Allocate Resources

The company can save money by decreasing the number of bonuses that they give to employees. It’s up to HR to find out how to allocate limited rewards and monetary gains to workers by looking at the performance review. Of course, employee wages are one of the last (if not the last) categories of spending that you’ll want to reduce. Unfortunately, this might be inevitable.

In the meantime, make sure to let employees know you appreciate their efforts. This might be something as simple as sending an email or keeping your office door open at times to indicate you’re willing to talk. Lines of communications are more important then ever, despite (and perhaps even because of) the possibility of disappointing news.

Evaluate Programs

The company should determine which programs to cut down, and which are useful and should continue throughout the recession. For example, if the company has a high rate of accidents, then they should not cut down the safety training program.

A common mistake that employers make is cutting down training development. However, training is vital in building skills and capabilities for future employees. Short, microlearning modules are an affordable option that can minimize spending while ensuring that employees continue to develop necessary skills even during a recession.

Using SWOT Analysis to Help You

The SWOT analysis stands for strength, weakness, opportunity, and threats. This report allows HR to create cost-benefit data about which strategies contribute the most to the business. It helps them indicate which programs should stay and which should go.

Another thing is that SWOT analysis can indicate if recruitment should be reduced or not. The report will show if there are enough funds to incorporate more workers and how many current employees you can maintain. SWOT analysis provides a useful way to avoid unnecessary employee cuts. With thorough analysis, you might even identify wasteful fund usage in areas like corporate events, technology, and other categories where budget restriction isn’t as crucial as it is for your employees.

Flexibility

It’s vital to create a plan to move workers to where they needed to be. That means you should train your workforce to take on various roles in the company in case you may have to suspend the hiring process.

Another creative and flexible approach is to use workers and technology together. That means you can have employees work 30 hours a week, and use technology to perform the remaining jobs. You can also have recruiters to get on board in the company to manage the employee. In order for this to work, internal communication is vital. You must ensure adequate pathways to communicate even between departments.

Avoid Constant Layoffs

Organizations must avoid constant layoffs. This demoralizing cycle can strip employees away from the security and comfort of working for your company. It’s best to use layoffs as a last resort, and instead make other cuts so that your employees still feel a personal connection to your company.

If a worker who has the most experience and works the hardest in the company observes massive layoffs during the recession, then he or she would be discouraged from continuing their work. Your top employees might start looking for another job that will give them the security that they need. This issue would entail losing a valuable worker and wasting hours of training them.

Keep Employees Informed

Companies need to find the right balance between transparency and not scaring the workers. That means it’s essential to keep the employees informed about the recession and solutions to deal with it, but not share too much information that would put personal connections at stake. After all, no one likes walking into work to find out that the business is cutting half of its employees. Honest internal communication is essential, and it prevents the company from burning any bridges with employees.

To prevent social media backlash and maintain the trust of current employees, it’s vital to handle layoffs professionally and respectfully.

Gratitude

Companies need to show gratitude and appreciation for staff members who have worked hard and take on more responsibilities than other workers.

Gratitude often comes in forms of better recognition and new titles. Showing appreciation can reduce the worker’s fear that they could be the next ones to get fired. Gratitude can come in a variety of forms, such as a pizza lunch or gift card as a small token of appreciation to show that the company acknowledges the employee’s hard work. Praise maintains personal connections between employees and managers, even when economic times are difficult.

Empathy

The worst way to handle a layoff is to have security escort the worker out of the door. This issue can discourage the remaining workers, causing them to look for another job.

There is a proper way of laying someone off. It’s vital to show empathy by understanding how they may feel about the situation. That means being respectful with the individual getting laid off by explaining the reasons and thanking them for being in the company.

It’s also essential for the department to sit down with the remaining workers to discuss potential layoffs, benefits, and severance. HR can let eligible workers know that they can reapply when the company hires again.

Ensure Everyone is Inspired

The most valuable aspect of the survival of the company during a recession is the employee’s passion and love for the organization. If the workers invest their heart and soul in the company, they will take on a new role and work extremely hard to get the task finished despite having a shortage of staff.

They are more likely to take a pay cut but work harder to ensure that the company stays alive. If the workers are inspired and passionate about the organization, they will do whatever it takes to keep it thriving during the recession.

The best way to ensure that everyone is vested in the company’s success is to motivate them and to promise a better future. Employers that are honest and trustworthy are most likely to create inspiring people.

It’s a good idea to let employees know that there could be a potential raise or bonuses after the recession. That way, it keeps them motivated to work twice as hard for the survival of the organization.

Enhance communication

Before a recession or anything that happens to a company, the organization must have a good relationship with its employees.

The best way to do this is to hire a consultant such as VP Legacies to create strategies to build a great relationship and identify opportunities for personal growth and connection with employees.

The primary strategy is to focus on empathy and consistency to improve employee retention. These communication strategies are essential to help both employers and employees to cope with the recession.

Keeping Everyone in the Loop

Owning and/or managing a company is like a roller coaster ride. One minute you are on top of the world, and the next you’re facing a recession. It’s easy for a company to thrive and do well during economic growth, but when the recession happens, the organization will have to find ways to survive.

The main objective is to save money and to cut down on unnecessary programs. Another aspect of survival is to lay off employees. However, the best way to help your workers prepare for the recession is to show empathy, gratitude, and keep them informed during the situation.

There are also other strategies, such as understanding the metric, data, and swot analysis of the company to get an overall report of what to expect during the downsizing process.

With the proper techniques and skills, your company would be able to prepare employees successfully during the recession if you engage your employees. To get started with eLearning, microlearning, and other strategies to help your employees feel valued and engaged, check out VP Legacies courses and more.